


cross my fingers (I don't know)

by thememoriesfire



Category: Glee
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-23
Updated: 2011-08-23
Packaged: 2017-10-22 23:41:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/243866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thememoriesfire/pseuds/thememoriesfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Quinn and Rachel, at graduation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	cross my fingers (I don't know)

**Author's Note:**

> [This was written ages ago but somehow got lost in the transfer.]

It was a _wonderful_ speech.

She doesn’t get a chance to say anything to the speech-giver until much later, at the reception, afterwards.  It’s in the gym, and some part of Rachel wonders if this is just where everything they ever say to each other will take place--bathrooms or gymnasiums.

Judy Fabray has gone all out for the occassion and Quinn, frankly, looks delectable; her red dress is elegant and simple, country club appropriate without aging her, but she’s made her outfit more youthful by wearing a scrappy pair of Converse underneath.  It’s part of a Glee club pledge to do something as a team, one last time, and Rachel’s borrowed a pair of Chucks from Brittany to make good on the promise.  They’re giving her blisters and they’re a size too big, so she can’t help but feel like she’s a duck wobbling forward most of the time, but--

Nothing about this, she would change for the world.

Finn’s arm slides around her back, and he leans in and says, “Great speech, wasn’t it?”

“Of course it was,” Rachel says, tearing her eyes away from Quinn--currently being congratulated by a somewhat down-crazed Sue Sylvester, and looking at him.  “Did you have any doubts?”

He shakes his head and then softens into that boyish smile that she’s never, ever been able to resist; the one where he’s being himself, genuinely, rather than what everyone expects him to be.  “I’m going to miss you.   _Both_ of you,” he says, before picking her up into a hug.  Her bra strap slips off her arm when he lifts, and she squeals--softly, thankfully--but then wraps her arms around him anyway.

“We’ll miss you too, Finn.  We’ll be back; Thanksgiving and Christmas,” she says.

The look on his face is forgiving, when he puts her down.  “Maybe the first year, but--I don’t know, Rach.  You were always going on to bigger things, and it’s not us you’re taking with you.”

He’s not bitter about it.  That took a few months, and a lot of yelling and drama and slamming of doors; but he’s not bitter about it anymore.

“How’s my favorite Jew?” Puck yells, behind her, before lifting her up and running halfway across the room with her.  She laughs and kicks at him until he puts her down, and then even _he_ has a pretty serious look on his face.

“Oh, Noah,” she says, and there’s that first wave of tears; she knew they were coming, but for _Noah_?

“Look, I wasn’t gonna say anything,” he says, glancing to the floor for just a moment.  “But--Beth’s birthday is May 12th, and if someone doesn’t do something to distract her she gets seriously messed up.  I mean, I barely even talked to her throughout junior year, but she came to my house that night, like, off her _ass_ drunk--and don’t look at me like that, once and never again, Jesus--”

Rachel squeezes his arm, feeling the muscle flex; it’s a weird thing to know she’s going to miss, but he gives the _best_ hugs.  “What helps?”

“It’s the only day of the year she talks about it, so--listen to her, and shit.   _Make_ her talk about it.  She keeps a lot inside, it’s not good for her.  Okay?” he says, ducking his head just a little to catch her eye.  “If anyone can make this like, actually _okay_ for her, it’s you.”

She feels a twinge of shame at not having known about this, but--he’s right.  Quinn keeps her cards close, and she knows she’s seen more than most.  Maybe it’s for the best, that she’s been spreading them around.  It’s been hard enough for both of them without the added pressure of also being the only person Quinn can talk to.

Though of course, that’s exactly where they’re going now.

“Scram, Puckerman,” Santana says, over her shoulder.  “Time for girl talk.”

“That code for hooking up?  Because I’m down, you know--”

“Rachel, I need like seven tampons.  I’m bleeding everywhere,” Santana says, shooting Puck a small smile, until he goes green in the face and heads back towards Lauren’s family.

“Gross,” Brittany says.  “You need to see a doctor.”

“I’m not--oh, boy,” Santana says, laughing and wrapping an arm around Britt’s waist.  “I’m fine.  We’re here to talk to Rachel, remember?”

“Oh, right,” Brittany says, pressing a kiss to Santana’s temple and then smiling at Rachel.

She feels envious of them.  They struggled for a long time to find a balance that worked, but once they did, it was like two magnets soared together from other sides of the room.  It’s not like that, for her, or for _them_.  It’s always been a little bit more of a tug and shove, and it’s hard work.  She likes to think that to the outside world, eventually, she and Quinn will look exactly like this; but on the inside--

“She’s going to try to bail,” Santana says, abruptly serious.  “It’s going to be different and scary and she’s going to be fucking _terrified_ that people find out where she’s from, and that she had a kid, and she’s going to try to bail when things get difficult.”

“Quinn’s like a secret quitter,” Brittany says, her left hand wrapped around Santana’s waist, gently kneading there.  “Like, she’ll make it look like she’s not quitting but she quits on the inside.  And then it’s like, where’d she go?  And next thing you know you’re Captain of the Cheerios and stuff.”

Some part of Rachel wants to say something at that; protest it, maybe, but they’re Quinn’s _best friends_.  They wouldn’t just be saying this to be malicious; Santana forgave Quinn for a lot of shit after some nudging from Brittany, and they’re actually really, really close now.

“Why are you telling me this?” she asks, hating how small her voice sounds, but they’re honing in on her worst fears--the ones she hasn’t told anyone about.  How she’s hanging her future up on someone who, at the best of times, is only semi-reliable.  How she thinks she might actually give up on her dreams if they don’t work out alongside this five month old relationship that really, has been building for four years now.

“Because, Berry, you’re like a fucking pitbull.  We’re going to be all the way cross-country and we won’t be able to talk her out of doing the stupidest shit she could ever do to herself; so you’re going to need to be ready for it, and dig your teeth in, and not let go.”  Santana’s face flushes briefly, and then she adds, very grudgingly, “You’re good for her.  Better than anyone else she’s ever been with.  So don’t fuck it up.”

“She loves you, you know.  She won’t show it much, but it’s all there, like a big ball of ice cream in her chest,” Brittany adds, before leaning forward and giving Rachel a quick, one-armed squeeze.  “So like, melt it and stuff.  It’s best when it’s a little gooey.”

Rachel chuckles without wanting to, and then glances at Santana over Brittany’s shoulder and murmurs a soft ‘thanks’.

She’s alone for a few moments after that, and looks back over the crowd; it’s automatic, the way her eyes seek out Quinn.  After two years of having to repress it and one year of having to hide it, she absolutely relishes the fact that it doesn’t matter so much anymore.

“Ah, young love,” Kurt says, strolling over.  He’s designed his own cap, and it’s like an abstract play on the original, with a few sparkles into the tassle.  “My God, Rachel, I’m so glad I’m not living with you after all;  all the GOGA might make me vomit.”

“The _what_?”

Kurt smiles and links their arms together.  “Nevermind.  Let’s just enjoy this for what it is: our last, fond farewell.”

“We’re getting out,” she says, in that same dazed voice that she’s had to use when saying those words all of this year; at her acceptance letter to Tisch, at Quinn’s to Columbia, and at Kurt’s to FIT.  “We’re actually getting out.”

“The stage awaits us, my lady,” Kurt says, dipping her in a quick dance move that has her grabbing onto his gown and laughing abruptly.  He grins at her and says, “I’m going to find Sam.  He’s not saying anything, but I know it’s killing him that he needs another year to save.  As if I’m giving up on that boy now.  Honestly.  Why are we with such silly, silly people?”

“Because they’re wonderful,” Rachel says, glancing off into the distance, to where Quinn is looking straight at her with an almost blinding smile.  She feels it in her fingertips, that look, and then looks back at Kurt.  “Because we’re half the people without them than we are with them.”

Kurt gets an endearing and uncommon shy look on his face and clears his throat before saying, “I... at the risk of oversharing.  I think I’m ... giving him something to remember me by later.”

Rachel’s mind jumps to a response that she thankfully manages to tamp down on, and then just squeezes him into a hug, saying, “It’ll be--oh, Kurt.  I don’t even know what to tell you.  It’ll be awkward, and spectacular, and everything you’ve ever wanted.”

He smiles against her cheek, she can feel it, and says, “May we always be this happy.”

“May we indeed,” she says, in kind, and they exchange quick kisses before he flounces out of the room again, to where Sam is sitting with an empty punch cup and his younger brother outside.

Tina and Mike dance by, and Puck wheels Artie past the table full of orange juice--they gave up on punch after senior prom, where Brittany had gotten so drunk without meaning to that she’d ended up tearing off Santana’s prom dress in the middle of the announcements near the end--and Rachel feels like her heart’s literally swimming in joy.  All of that spikes tremendously when she finally crosses the gym again, though, and Quinn’s fingers flex and unflex twice before reaching for hers.

“Where’s your dads?’ she asks, softly, while Judy talks to Sue about something or other--possibly how the best way to organize debutante balls like they’re military boot camps, as the word “pageant” is dropped a few times--and Rachel leans into her side reflexively.

“Getting my present.  It’s hard to hide a car somewhere, but they’ve tried so valiantly to do it that I’m working up to my surprised face,” she says.

“What are we going to do with a car?” Quinn asks, glancing at Rachel’s face and then at the top of her dress, and Rachel grins for a second before saying, “Up here, Fabray.”

“Seriously though.”

Rachel shrugs.  “We’ll be back in Lima a lot.  I’ll find a way to keep it with us.  It would make it a lot easier for Kurt to go and see Sam, and... I don’t know.  We could go--explore stuff.  Together.”

“Like trips into the country side.”

“Yes, the native wilds of Jersey,” Rachel says, as seriously as she can.

Quinn laughs quietly, because there is a lot of etiquette training that she has to get past before Quinn will actually just give _in_ and act like a giddy teenager, but it’s enough for now.  Rachel squeezes her hand and says, “Your speech was wonderful.”

“Someone very articulate helped me with it.  I think it made the difference,” Quinn says.  When Rachel glances over, there is a really unexpectedly soft look on her face, and maybe the first hint of some tears.

“You know, I would’ve loved to be able to say that I’m dating the prom queen,” Rachel says, softly; and it’s true.  Their decision to not go senior year had had more to do with not wanting to rub their relationship in anyone’s face--Quinn’s words, not Rachel’s--than with Quinn’s chances of winning.  “But I’ll never be more proud of you than when I tell everyone we’re going to meet in the city that you were our school’s valedictorian.”

Quinn gives her a watery smile and says, “I’m still pretty upset about how you ruined prom for me, by the way.”

Rachel smiles back and says, “I’m going to spend the rest of my life trying to make up for it.  Trust me.”

Her dads, mismatched as always, bustle up to them moments later with a conspicuous set of keys in their hands, and Rachel squeals in her very best off-Broadway imitation of _I got the role!_ before jumping up and down a few times.

“Take her out, girls; it’s a lovely day.  Go and do something--non-academic,” her Dad says, and her Daddy just ruffles her _it took me two hours to fix it like this_ graduation hair until she swats his hand away.

“Are you sure?” Quinn asks, before glancing at her mother.

Their family dinners are never going to be the most comfortable, but Judy’s learning to like Rachel’s dads as people, and Rachel as--well.  Maybe it’s that latter part that’s the hang-up, but she hides it well and says, “You’ve earned it, Quinnie”, in a way that sounds like she actually means it.

Quinn’s hand is around her waist a moment later, but Rachel’s held back by Sue Sylvester’s arm on her shoulder.

“She has the most potential out of any cheerleader I’ve ever worked with,” Sue says, deadly serious and all levels of threatening.  Rachel stares back unflinchingly and says, “She’s a lot more than a cheerleader, Coach Sylvester.”

Sue’s hidden smile is full of approval, and when Quinn tugs her out of the gym, the doors slamming shut behind them, the air that fills Rachel’s lungs is so full of promise it almost burns.  She takes a tentative step forward, almost expecting her legs to give out, but they don’t.  

She’s rock solid.  She’s _ready_.

“Start spreading the news,” Quinn mumbles against her neck, hugging her tightly from behind, both of them taking wobbly steps forward.

For once in her life, Rachel doesn’t feel like singing; she just spins around and says, “New York or anywhere; I don’t even really care, as long as it’s with you.”

Quinn’s eyes smile before the rest of her does, and she seals their future with a quick burst of a kiss.

 


End file.
